Educating the Heart

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School has already started, or will be starting shortly in the northern hemisphere, and educators are thinking about how to prepare for another school year in the southern hemisphere. The Charter wants to help in both cases. While we might refer to this newsletter as a SPECIAL EDUCATION ISSUE, it is more than that--it is for everyone--no matter your age.

Before we go into some new happenings in education that the Charter is planning, it seems this is a good time to re-introduce you to material we have on our website and to ask you to consider some possible actions. Do you know we have a Charter for Compassionate Schools? Yes, we have, and you'll find it under the Education Sector of our website. Hundreds of schools and even school districts have signed the Charter and we hope that you too will spread the word. There is also a Children's Charter for Compassion for younger students with a link to activity books to support the teaching of compassion.

Another special feature located in the Education Sector is The Compassion Education Reader. The Compassion Education Reader is divided into topics that range in presentation frominvestigating compassion and other related skills (i.e., altruism, empathy, forgiveness, gratitude, happiness, integrity, justice, kindness, mindfulness, resilience, self-compassion, and responsibility), and finding ways that they can be applied to education, to reading about some of the latest research on the science of compassion.

Of utmost importance for parents, as well as teachers, are articles that relate directly to raising a responsible child. Also, there are two sections that speak to new ideas and theories about education. "Thinking about Education," provides background information and in most cases, video presentations on radical ("getting to the root") and transformational ideas for the classroom and beyond, from pre-school to graduate school, and within community-based settings."Successful Education Models and Organizations" presents new approaches that are demonstrating some significant measure of success throughout the global community.

Announcing Our First Education Global Read: How Fast Can You Run

Join author Harriet Levin Millan and protagonist of How Fast Can You Run, Michael Majok Kuch, in a book discussion on February 22, 2017. Register here.

This is a tremendous opportunity to plan to read a book that Kirkus Review calls "A deeply felt novel of grace and intelligence." How Fast Can You Run will be released on October 26, 2016. If you are a teacher, assign the book for a class read or as a special project. If you are a Charter member of any age join the call. Link here for additional information and background and study guide material. Purchase How Fast Can You Run through Amazon: www.smile.amazon.com and sign-up to support the Charter for Compassion International.

Set across a backdrop of refugee migration that spans Africa, America and Australia, How Fast Can You Run is the inspiring story of Michael Majok Kuch and his journey to find his mother. In 1988, Majok, as a five-year-old boy, fled his burning village in southern Sudan when the North systematically destroyed it, searching for John Garang, the South’s leader. Majok, along with thousands of other fleeing people, many of them unaccompanied minors, trekked through the wilderness in Sudan, Ethiopia, and Kenya to arrive at a series of refugee camps where he would live for the next ten years. When the U.S. brokered an agreement, granting approximately 4,000 unaccompanied minors political asylum, Majok, now Michael, was given a new start in the U.S. Yet his new life was not without trauma. He faced prejudice once again, disrupting the promise of his new beginnings. This is a story of a survivor who in facing challenge after challenge summons the courageous spirit of millions of refugees throughout history and today.

The Green World Campaign has planted millions of trees on degraded land on three continents. It is today teaching tens of thousands of schoolchildren in Kenya to plant seedbed nurseries and grow multipurpose trees that supply them with extra nutrition while they learn about ecology and global citizenship.

This has led to several pilot programs with American schools, including the Punahou School in Hawaii (where a pen-pal project was set up with a Kenya school) and the Masters School in New York. As well, school choirs from Malaysia, Kenya, Indonesia and the U.S. have publicly performed a tree-planting song written for this project by famed Disney composer Alan Menken.

We believe that expanding such programs can not only inform but empower schoolchildren about global problems they are all too aware of. Schools or individual classes would not only act locally by planting trees in their own schoolyards, backyards, and communities, but affiliate with schools in Kenya that today struggle with land degradation, poverty, and hunger. A portion of funds raised would be donated to help African children plant useful trees which could be geotagged and shared online via “story-mapping" and letter exchanges. All the children will have an opportunity to practice what GWC founder Marc Barasch (author of The Compassionate Life) calls "green compassion," and get a tangible sense that their generation can work together to heal the world.

We invite anyone who is interested in planting new seeds of hope on common ground to work with us to develop and grow this innovative program worldwide! Explore the Green World Campaign website and sign up to plant trees.

IN OUR SON'S NAME is an intimate portrait of Phyllis and Orlando Rodríguez, whose son, Greg, dies with thousands of others in the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. The bereaved parents choose reconciliation and nonviolence over vengeance and begin a transformative journey that both confirms and challenges their convictions.

They speak out against war in Iraq and Afghanistan, publicly oppose the death penalty of avowed 9/11 conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui and befriend his mother. As their search for meaning evolves they speak out against anti-Muslim actions and find peace in working with prison inmates.

Their marriage strengthens, and they reach a deeper understanding of their rebellious son, who had just begun to find his way when his life was cut short. The film mixes in-depth interviews with on-location footage and striking archival photographs and video to create a deeply personal story that invites us to re-consider conventional concepts of justice and healing.

In Our Son's Name may also be viewed on WORLD, a digital channel that is produced and distributed by WGBH/Boston, American Public Television (APT) and WNET/New York, in association with Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) and the National Educational Telecommunications Association (NETA). More information at http://worldchannel.org.

The Global Unity Games last for 11 days: they begin on September 11th and end on September 21st. This year marks the 15th Anniversary of September 11th and the 35th annual International Day of Peace. In 2001 the International Day of Peace took place on 9/11. Earlier, the UN General Assembly had decided that the International Day of Peace should be permanently observed on September 21st starting in 2002. Our colleagues at We, The World looked at Peace Day moving from September 11th to September 21st, and were inspired to launch 11 Days of Global Unity as a time to promote and celebrate compassionate action around the world.

There are many ways that individuals and teams can play, from organizing creative service projects to give back to one’s community to performing acts of kindness to promote unity of the human family. All players will receive an Agent of Compassion mission to use each day of the Global Unity Games, offering meaningful, tangible ideas and inspiration for activities as a way to play. Players then report on their activities on the Compassion Report Map. The reports of Registered Teams are reflected on the Global Unity Games Scoreboard, displaying the number of volunteers, number of hours served, number of people served, and the monies raised for local or global causes.

Contact the Charter

Want to partner up with a Compassionate School in another part of the world? Let us know so that we can make the introduction. Want to sponsor a compassion festival or fair? Contact us so we can help. Learn more about theCharter's Education Partners--there are close to 400.

Support the educaton work of the Charter so that we can continue to network and bring compassion to the heart of our learning experiences.

About Us

Charter for Compassion provides an umbrella for people to engage in collaborative partnerships worldwide. Our mission is to bring to life the principles articulated in the Charter for Compassion through concrete, practical action in a myriad of sectors.